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Find Goverment Owned Foreclosures, Seizures, & Repossessions

Our site is designed to give you information about foreclosures from all the government agencies such as the VA, HUD, FHA, IRS, Fannie Mae, Customs, Freddie Mac, and others. Government owned property for sale includes single family homes, multi-family homes, commercial and industrial properties, and land. Unless you are a real pro in this area, we think you’ll be surprised at the variety of agencies that have properties for sale that you might take advantage of. For instance, who would have guessed that the Army Corps of Engineers did?

We have sorted many of the following agencies that have bargain properties by “single family” and “multifamily” and we’ve listed a few agencies under both. However, most of the agencies could have both, depending on what comes up in their inventories. In general you need to use these lists as a starting point for further research. It won’t take you long to come up with numerous possibilities for investment.

We also provide you with general information about the foreclosure and short sale processes and real estate investment. Real estate has been a great source of wealth for generations. Even if you are in foreclosure yourself, there are ways that you can profit from real estate. We will constantly provide new and updated information on real estate, investments, and financial matters. Check back regularly and use the links to detailed resources on the various government agencies and financial information.

All the information on our site is provided free and is supported by our advertisers.

We’ll even try to answer your specific questions when we can. We’ll post the questions and our answers on the site. Just email R3@govhomes.com.

From the Department of Veterans Affairs
The Department of Veterans Affairs deals with the famous VA-financed loans and VA-guaranteed loans for veterans. Unfortunately, because of the low down payments and interest rates, many of these homes are foreclosed and become available for investors like you. These properties are then sold for the government by others, including local Realtors in every area. The VA site can help you find properties and Realtors. You can also approach your local realty offices to find an agent who is qualified to show you VA properties. Much more information on how to proceed is available when you click on the site above. Learn more about working with realtors.

From the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, most often simply called the FDIC, is known for insuring your personal deposits at your bank (up to $250K). In the process of taking over failing banks, or helping them back on their feet, the FDIC can end up with properties. Since they’re not in the business of owning or managing properties, they sell them off. This agency is not the easiest one to work with for individual investors, and you’ll find that their website has a few quirks, but it is a possibility.

From the Internal Revenue Service
When you don’t pay federal taxes to your friendly IRS they get grumpy. Even worse, they can seize a property and sell it at a tax auction to get their money. (Even then if they don’t get enough they stay on your case.) Typically the IRS doesn’t have a lot of properties, but they have a small list nationwide that is easy to understand. When you click above you’ll see the current offerings.

From the US Army Corps of Engineers
The Corps does more than build levies and other engineering projects. In Savanna they have a division that deals with selling homes that used to be owned by employees and others who had to move because of base closures and other issues (such as disability). Their website says they cover the Eastern states and even have homes in Europe where we have bases (at this time only Germany). However, we’ve found that they also occasionally have some homes in the Western states. Their list of homes is generally short, but they’re easy to understand.

From Customs
Who knew? Customs doesn’t just grab and sell off drug runners’ fast boats, they have houses, land, and lots more too. In fact, this site represents several other agencies or sub agencies as well such as the Secret Service. As is often the case, these are “cash” sales. (Actually, the want a cashiers or certified check.) You are responsible for obtaining any funding you need.

From the U.S. Marshals Service
This is another agency which sells properties obtained by multiple agencies, including Drug Enforcement, the FBI, BATF, and others. Depending on what is seized, they sell all kinds of property (residential, commercial, land) in addition to the personal property which you’d expect such as jewelry, cars, and so on.

From Freddie Mac - Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (FHLMC)
Freddie Mac is the other big government agency that has brought most of the foreclosures and short sales onto the market. They call their site HomeSteps and it has a lot of useful information about different programs. They usually have lots of properties for sale. They also have some standard advice about talking to your lender if you are in trouble with your mortgage and other material from that side of the fence.

From Realtor.com
This is the site of the National Association of Realtors®. It lists lots of homes for sale all over the country, but only those listed by an agent. Many of the homes on other sites are not listed here, although some are. As mentioned in the comments on Working With Realtors, most Realtors are not familiar with short sales, foreclosures, and other unusual situations. Sometimes this is because foreclosure-type sales do not always pay full commissions and many buyers just want a “regular” house. If you’re an investor searching for these special bargains, it will pay you to find a good Realtor who is experienced in this area.

Sources of Multifamily Properties

From HUD
As mentioned above under the first Housing and Urban Development listing, HUD has many programs. This link will take you to their multifamily section.

From Fannie MaeAs mentioned under the first Fannie Mae listing, Fannie has lots of different programs. This is the specific link to their multifamily listing section.

From the General Services Administration (GSA) (2nd Link)
The GSA probably manages more property than anyone. Things change on their site so we’ve given you two places to click. Even then be sure to explore since there are places for auctions and even buying lighthouses! The GSA doesn’t have many single-family properties, you can search for the occasional one by clicking here.

From the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)As mentioned in their first listing, the FDIC ends up with lots of properties of all kinds because of their insurance program. When you get to the site, simply click on the type of property you are interested in and they will take you to the appropriate section.

Foreclosure
A lot of the sites we list also have information about the foreclosure process, and about government programs to help you avoid or deal with foreclosure. Some links to that kind of info follow. The surprise is that you can invest in real estate even when you are bankrupt or in foreclosure yourself. It’s not easy, but programs and books about how to buy real estate with nothing down have dealt with this situation for decades. For instance, Robert Allen and many others have written several books that deal with “nothing down.” Years ago Allen also took the challenge to be dropped in strange cities with no money and no credit. In each case he was able to purchase multiple properties for nothing down.

More
There are so many government agencies and so many links between them that sometimes there are several ways to find a particular property. We’ve given you multiple sites to check in order to be comprehensive. When we weren’t sure what the overlap was we put in all the options to make sure you didn’t miss anything.